Zed's Magic Thread

[Mim]

If you decide to work on some Dreadful Spells, I'd love to see what you come up with (I'm sure I'm not the only one).

Speaking of which, I've been working on some additional ones (beyond Holding Spell) as well, though it's tricky to add anything more powerful than what they've done with the Nazgûl (which are nasty enough ).

[zedturtle]

The Lore of Changing Hues
You have learned that there is more to the world than can be seen by unaided mortal eyes. You will first learn to see the world better by the faint light of the stars, then see the world of spirits in times of need, and finally you will be able to change your own hue in that world.

• Starlight Sight
  Frodo looked up at the Elf standing tall above him, as he gazed into the night, seeking a mark to shoot at. His head was dark, crowned with sharp white stars that glittered in the black pools of the sky behind.
  
  If you have learned the trick of Starlight Sight, you may spend a point of Hope. For the next few moments (3 rounds or so in combat), you are not troubled by low light conditions. You received no penalties for darkness. However, you must have some light... this spell will do know good in the utter darkness below the earth.
  
  Vision of the Other Side
  To Frodo it appeared that a white light was shining through the form and raiment of the rider, as if through a thin veil.
  
  Once you have learned to perceive the world by the faintest light within it, you may begin to learn how to see beyond this world. When you cast this spell, you have a brief glimpse of your surroundings as they appear on the other side. Those who have seen great blessedness may shine forth as white beacons, those sustained by the Shadow will be dark and wraith-like. Objects, too, may reveal some hint of their character (if power has been invested into those objects). The glimpse only lasts for a moment, and stone or other natural materials may cloud your sight of the other side.
  
  The Changed Hue
  No quote yet. Probably something about Saruman hiding himself.
  
  Those who have learned to see the other side know that others of power may learn much from their vision. At times, it may be best to present yourself as more powerful or less powerful than you might really be. When you cast this spell you may choose to either appear more powerful or less powerful. If you choose to be more powerful, you appear to possess a radiance equal to twice your Wisdom (so a wise mortal might appear to be a middling Wizard). If you choose to appear less powerful, you appear to possess a radiance equal to half your Wisdom (so a wise mortal might appear ordinary, and a middling Wizard might appear to be a wise mortal).
  
  These changes are on the other side, no outward change is visible in the mundane world. This spell will fool most viewers, the especially powerful or wise will not be fooled (if a viewer has a Wisdom score that is 2 or more points higher than your normal, unmodified, score, he or she can see through the glamour). Using this spell in any non-heroic way will prompt a Corruption test. Using to actively fool one of the Wise is worth an automatic Shadow point.

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The spells to key into Gandalf's description of Radagast as a 'master of shapes and changes of hue' has had me stumped for a long time. Finally, I thought about trinary color things: RGB got me nowhere, but HSV (Hue - Saturation - Value) inspired the first two spells... the third is a natural extension of the second.

As always, feedback is very important. Tell me what you think... am I off-base here? Is having a (sort of) detect magic spell too much?

[zedturtle]

Hmmm... No feedback is good feedback? bad feedback?

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I'm absolutely stumped for the Lore of Shaping as well. Any suggestions?

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A preview of the guide in progress:

[Southron]

Hmmm... No feedback is good feedback? bad feedback?

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I'm absolutely stumped for the Lore of Shaping as well. Any suggestions?

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A preview of the guide in progress:

The guide looks impressive. Could lore of shaping be a bit of illusion similar to when Saruman appeared before the 3 hunters in a shape similar to Gandalf?

[poosticks7]

The guide looks impressive. Could lore of shaping be a bit of illusion similar to when Saruman appeared before the 3 hunters in a shape similar to Gandalf?

Isn't that the other way around?

[zedturtle]

The guide looks impressive. Could lore of shaping be a bit of illusion similar to when Saruman appeared before the 3 hunters in a shape similar to Gandalf?

Isn't that the other way around?

Depends on your point of view. Saruman appears to Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli; then the three see Gandalf the White for the first time and do not recognize him at first.

"And how will you learn that Master Dwarf? Saruman could look like me in your eyes, if it suited his purpose with you. And are you wise enough to detect all his counterfeits?"

In any case, it's an idea, but the Lore of Seeming already has Other Guise and that would seem to cover that ability.

[Southron]

In any case, it's an idea, but the Lore of Seeming already has Other Guise and that would seem to cover that ability.

Oops! Didn't review the older lore posts and I forgot about that one.

[Glorelendil]

I have to admit that...however much I love your work...I'm not a fan of "Changing Hues" as a title, despite the source quote. What's a word that has to do with the boundary between material/spiritual realms?

My only other critique is that an awful lot of these abilities require spending a point of Hope. If your character only has one or two "magical" abilities then it works out for them to cost hope, but if you wanted to build a character that had several of these Lores, he/she would be severely constrained in how they get used. I'd like to see some alternate mechanisms for ability use, perhaps with some kind of correlation to the type of ability. That is, spending "Hope" should be done out of desperation..."Hail Mary Passes", as I've said several times in this forum.

Other mechanics (some of which have been discussed) could be: gaining Fatigue, losing Endurance, risking a bad outcome on a failed roll, and now with Rivendell coming out maybe attracting the Eye of Mordor.

But those criticisms are vastly outweighed by my overall support of this project. And the formatting looks great.

[zedturtle]

I have to admit that...however much I love your work...I'm not a fan of "Changing Hues" as a title, despite the source quote. What's a word that has to do with the boundary between material/spiritual realms?

Cool. Thanks for the feedback... I'm not real thrilled with Changing Hues, nor any of the stuff derived from Radagast's stuff... especially since we never get to see him "on screen". I did go with the Saruman of Many Colours quote for the last spell in that set, which does try to tie it back together.

Perhaps I need to worry less about explicating the magic mentioned for Radagast and just work up appropriate stuff... I think the spells are justifiable/appropriate, right?

My only other critique is that an awful lot of these abilities require spending a point of Hope. If your character only has one or two "magical" abilities then it works out for them to cost hope, but if you wanted to build a character that had several of these Lores, he/she would be severely constrained in how they get used. I'd like to see some alternate mechanisms for ability use, perhaps with some kind of correlation to the type of ability. That is, spending "Hope" should be done out of desperation..."Hail Mary Passes", as I've said several times in this forum.

I hear you. But, (almost) all of the magic things in the source rules use Hope (Night-Goer, Staunching Song, Broken Spells, Wood-elf Magic, etc.) as a limiter. My PbP group is big... eight players with two Hobbits and a Beorning pastry chef; so we have 11 Fellowship points. Plus, despite ideas to the contrary in the design doc, I doubt very many LMs will allow a full-on caster.

Maybe, if we kept Hope as the limiter, we need to have a way for casters to recover Hope faster than others. But it has to have an appropriate cost... Maybe a new Undertaking, whereby the caster can spend APs/XPs to recover Hope (up to a maximum, probably Wisdom)? A player that did that all the time would turn the caster into a one-trick pony and we've all seen that TOR punishes characters who are one-trick ponies.

(Everyone:) Is that an idea worth pursuing?

Other mechanics (some of which have been discussed) could be: gaining Fatigue, losing Endurance, risking a bad outcome on a failed roll, and now with Rivendell coming out maybe attracting the Eye of Mordor.

But those criticisms are vastly outweighed by my overall support of this project. And the formatting looks great.[/quote]

[Glorelendil]

Another option would be for abilities that cost hope, but then instantly refund the hope if successful. (Or, alternately, are free actions that cost hope on a failure.)

But...still...some of the abilities seem a awkward fit with the Hope mechanic. For example, if an ability gives you the ability to see "true natures" (such as in your Changing Hues lore), shouldn't it just happen? How would you know to spend the Hope in order to use it?